Chapter Text
“Hey there, Patches,” Tubbo said, shifting the papers in his hands to pet the cat.
“Tubbooo,” Tommy whined. “I’m dying.”
“It’s not that bad,” Tubbo said, standing up straight and depositing the papers on the kitchen table. He pulled out a chair next to Tommy, putting his backpack next to him on the ground.
“But it’s so much work! I was only gone for a month, how much of this could you have possibly done?”
“All of it,” Tubbo said. Tommy groaned.
“I don’t even do my homework most of the time, and now I have to do all this?”
“Well, half of it’s review for stuff we learned before you left, then there was a test which you don’t have to do, and you’ve finished about half of that, and half of the other half of what we learned after you left.”
“Too many halves,” Tommy muttered, flicking to the next page of work. “You’re helping me with all the rest still, right?”
“I’ve got my notes right here,” Tubbo said, patting his backpack.
“Thanks.” Tommy nodded. He turned in his chair, calling, “Dream!” Tubbo could hear crashing coming from somewhere upstairs, before Dream appeared on the stairs.
“What’s going on, what’s wrong?” Dream demanded, looking around wildly.
“We need to get pizza for dinner,” Tommy said. “It’s the best for doing school work.”
“Is that it?” Dream asked.
“Yep!” Tommy said brightly. Dream stared at Tommy for a minute.
“I’ll go order it.”
“Yay!” Tommy cheered. “Pizza study night!”
“You have to get a bunch of work done though, okay?” Dream asked.
“Yeah, yeah, I’ll get it done,” Tommy said, picking his pencil up and tapping it on the table. “Tubbo, how-”
“It’s like this,” Tubbo said, taking Tommy’s pencil and scribbling on an extra piece of paper.
“Maybe I could just copy your work,” Tommy suggested innocently.
“Then you’d fail the test. You’re grade’s already bad enough.”
“It’s November! There’s plenty of time to pull it up before next spring.”
“No. You’ve been working on this for the past three weeks, you have to work on the rest still. I’ll explain it to you, but you need to do at least half of it on your own.”
“So does that mean you’ll let me copy the other half?”
“Maybe. If you do the first half good.”
“It will be the best school work you’ve ever seen,” Tommy said, snatching the pencil back from Tubbo.
“Somehow I doubt that,” Tubbo said.
“I will electrocute you,” Tommy threatened.
“I’m your best friend, you’d never do that!” Tubbo said.
“I might,” Tommy said.
“Stop threatening Tubbo,” Dream said, causing Tommy and Tubbo to jump. They hadn’t heard him coming back downstairs.
“But it’s fun!” Tommy said jokingly. Dream laughed, ruffling his hair.
“No more fun for you. You have to catch up on your school work.”
“Don’t remind me,” Tommy grumbled, turning back to the stack of papers in front of him.
“You have a couple weeks to do the rest of the work. Just do this much today,” Dream said, separating a set of papers that was about a fourth of the remaining stack.
“I can do that,” Tommy conceded, taking the papers from Dream’s hand and pushing the rest aside.
“The pizza will be here in about 20 minutes,” Dream said, heading back for the stairs. “Call me down once it gets here.”
“Sure thing!” Tommy said.
“And if you get all the work done, you can start training Tubbo tonight,” Dream added.
“Tubbo, explain this again,” Tommy demanded immediately, snatching the pencil up from the table.
“It’s like this,” Tubbo said, taking the pencil from Tommy.
***
“Come on, Tubbo,” Tommy said. “You can do better than that.”
Tubbo frowned, swinging towards Tommy again. Tommy ducked into a roll, coming up behind Tubbo and grabbing his arm.
Tubbo sighed, yanking his arms away from Tommy.
“How do you do that?”
“Practice,” Tommy said, shrugging. “I’ve been doing this for years.”
“You’ve got to teach me,” Tubbo said.
“What do you think I’m trying to do?” Tommy asked.
“Yeah, yeah,” Tubbo said, righting his stance as Tommy had taught him. “Like this?”
“Move your left foot,” Tommy said. Tubbo shifted, holding up his fists.
“I’ll go easy on you this time,” Tommy said.
“You don’t have to,” Tubbo said. “The heroes won’t go easy.” Tommy winced. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to-”
“It’s fine,” Tommy said quickly. “It’s been a month, I’ll get over it. Now come on. We’ve got a lot of training before you can come out on patrol with us.”
“Okay,” Tubbo said. “I’ll get it next time.”
Tommy stepped to the side, blocking as Tubbo punched. Tommy went for his own hit, but Tubbo managed to stop him as he stepped back. Tommy feigned going to the right, but actually turned left. Tubbo spun on his heel, landing a hit on Tommy’s back.
“Sorry,” Tubbo said.
“No, that was great,” Tommy said, holding up his hand for a high five. “We’ll make a supervillain of you yet!”